Today we’d like to introduce you to Ryan Browning.
Ryan, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I ran a freestyle club with my friends Maxie and Miles back in high school, and a year later, we started making music our senior year. Since then, I’ve been making music with my friends all the time. I initially went to college for music business and audio engineering, but then, due to my theatre kid demeanor, switched my major over to the theatre, but at that point, I was well entrenched into the Nashville unground scene. When I came back to LA in 2020, I linked up with my college friend Kent Osbourne and we’ve been doing shows together, just like the college days. All the while, I’ve been pumping out EPs, albums, and stray video or visual albums. I’m just your friendly neighborhood Wicked Lemon dropping tunes that make my brain go brrr.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Honestly, the biggest obstacle for me is putting on shows. I have a hard time getting in touch with bookers. My friends often help me with that from time to time, but on my own, I definitely struggle with that. Also, just marketing in general; I’m terrible at it mostly due to my disdain to have to market myself and the energy it takes to do it well. I’m creative, and I would rather just make cool stuff and that be it, but it takes time and skill, and energy, and while I feel I have those things, they definitely fluctuate depending on the task at hand.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I’m an actor, cook, and musician. My best dishes are Tonkotsu ramen and Lemon bars, of which you can hit me up about if you’d like to order some. I make mostly hip-hop music, and I love to sample in the vein of MF DOOM. I love old-school hip-hop production. I think the song that most might know me by is Enraged off of ‘I’m Not Crazy’. I often play that when I’m a hype man for Kent Osbourne. Very punky, very fun. I’m incredibly proud of my visual album, “Nothing’, that I made with my good friend and manager, Jorge (@shotfromthepit). We worked very hard on it and it took about a year, and it may not be perfect, but we learned so much from it, and to be real, it still goes hella hard. I feel in this day and age, it can be hard to be super different from everyone else because of how quickly interests can spread and how intermingled our likes are. There are a lot of niches and that’s daunting but overall inspiring because that means you’ll find your audience eventually, as long as you’re unapologetically yourself. And that’s what I do to set myself apart, I be myself. I bring lemon bars to shows, I do my best to show out for the homies, and I rap about what I want to rap about. I’m just a whimsical lemon making do in this tough world.
What were you like growing up?
Growing up I’d say I was a pretty good kid, didn’t get into too much trouble, had good friends, most of which I have been able to keep. Parents and teachers loved me. I loved art in all its forms, but theatre and the performing arts definitely took hold of me. I went to theatre camp in my home state of Tennessee over the summers for a while, did Debby Allen summer intensives, was in just about all the choruses in HS. Musicals play, dances, I was about it. I also was a boy scout, and I still love the outdoors and camping, which I need to do more of tbh. You can ask a friend or a family member for an outside view, but I was sweet, loyal to my friends, silly, and passionate. IfI. got angry it was likely due to someone being unfair to me or my friends. Idk I was a regular kid, I think. You’d have to interview my clan for a better description of young me kekekeke.
Pricing:
- Catering is groceries plus +150
- BUY MY MUSIC ON BANDCAMP!!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.thewickedlemon.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thewickedlemon/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/fabiobenvolio
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/FabioBenvolio
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC6LuCxBod2aoc1YeDLyPFRQ
- SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/fabiobenvolio
- Other: https://fabiobenvolio.bandcamp.com/album/im-not-crazy
Image Credits
@outherevisuals @lannywebbin @emma.png
